Sunday musings 7/20/14: The Risk of Unshakeable Belief

2) Open. Oldest golf tournament in the world coming to a close as I type. Sergio comes up jusssst a bit short. Again.

Dude’ consistent. Gotta give him that.

3) Aviary. Mrs. bingo is the “Bird Whisperer.” Who knew there were so many types of birds in suburbia?

I remember when a robin was an exotic creature.

4) Change. The only thing that is constant is change. This applies everywhere to everything. Next weekend will bring the latest edition of the CrossFit Games. There will be change. Count on it. I have absolutely no inside information whatsoever, but you can make bank on this. There will be change.

How could I possibly know this? Well, a part of it is just a basic fact of life. Stuff changes. The other part is simply history. If you’ve been paying the least bit of attention the last, oh, 10 years or so, you’ve notice that the folks who run things in our little CrossFit world are ever and always changing things up. I’m not really sure if the Black Box is outwardly (or inwardly) any different, but the leadership team is constantly changing up the left side input to see what comes out of the right side. From where I sit each change has brought a net improvement. The only thing we know for sure is that there will be change next week at The CrossFit Games.

Now in reality, unless you make your living from The Games of from CrossFit, this particular change is more interesting than integral in your life. It’s the fact of change, the constancy of change, and more so how you handle it both tactically and emotionally, that determines your destiny. Prepare for change and plan for change, because change is what you’re gonna get.

5) Unshakeable. This week I spent some time talking to a couple of folks who, unbeknownst to them, were talking about each other. Well, talking to them is not really accurate–they were having a discussion and I was having a listen. Both were talking about the effects of a particular happening on a particular person, effects that both could surely see if only they cared to remove their blinders and look. They told wildly different stories. Their belief sets were so unshakeable, so impervious to penetration by petty inconveniences like facts and reality, it was as if they wore not lenses to clarify but masks to obscure.

The blind running from the blind, if you will.

I’m fascinated when I see this, and I do see this almost every day when I am plying my trade. So much of what is “known” about medicine isn’t really known at all but “felt”. I constantly run up against an unshakeable belief that is often expressed in a statement that begins “well, I would think that [you] would…” Indeed, I heard this from both folks telling me what was transpiring. I’m fascinated and exasperated in equal parts when I am on the listening end of this equation because of how completely this unshakeable belief nullifies the otherwise logical power of observable, measurable fact.

If I step back and think a little more deeply about this phenomenon I am also terrified that I, too, may harbor similarly unshakeable beliefs that blind me to the truths of a fact-based reality. This weekend brought a gathering of true experts in a particular field of my day job, one I was quite flattered to attend. There were a couple of points that I’m just convinced my colleagues got wrong, points of view it looks like I shared only with myself. Am I right? Is my insight so keen, my ability to analyze the data presented so much better, my advice so advanced that I am just a full step ahead of the rest of the group? Or is it rather that I am clinging to a point of view supported only by the virtual facts created by beliefs I am unable or unwilling to walk away from? The simple awareness that this may, indeed, be the case does place me in a better position than either of my conversational partners as far as ultimately being right, but is that enough?

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